Whether you observe from a window, staying warm and cozy, or venture outside to your backyard or beyond, you can take part in some citizen science this weekend.
It’s the 25th annual Great Backyard Bird Count through holiday Monday.
Saskatchewan spokesperson with Nature Conservancy of Canada, Sarah Ludlow, says you don’t have to be a bird expert.
There are free identifying apps or you could grab a bird book from the library.
When you are done, add your findings to the bird count dot org website https://www.birdcount.org/
A few examples of what the count does is it helps to track bird populations to see how they are changing over time, and if a species range is expanding or shrinking.
Ludlow says this is an international count and last year over 300,000 people took part.
In Canada, almost 44,000 lists were submitted from all the provinces and territories.

NCC says in a news release, “Bird populations in Canada are in flux. On the one hand, waterfowl and birds of prey appear to be growing in number, more than doubling their populations since 1970. On the other hand, shorebirds and aerial insectivores like swallows appear to be disappearing at alarming rates. NCC’s land conservation work protects criticaal habitat for these species in Saskatchewan.”